Tangy
by Deer-Pastel
Summary: "You do realise it's still dangerous out here, right?" "Of course I do," Or, how Arthur and Gilbert keep each other company while dangling their legs over their respective branches. [Zombie Apocalypse AU]


Arthur Kirkland felt like the biggest dunderhead alive. Feeling humiliation and embarrassment at his actions weren't anything new, of course, he was well aware that he was a flawed creature, and nothing he does would bare fruit of perfection. Humans were not perfect. Humans are not meant to be perfect.

The world couldn't be perfect.

Which was why, Arthur supposed darkly, the world has gone to hell. The zombies, the death, the pain and tears witnessed and experienced the past two months (was it two? Arthur lost count around the 40th-something day of the apocalypse) had truly taken a toll on him and his group of surviving friends and family.

At his train of thought, Arthur sucked in a sharp, shuddering breath, to which he had released a hiss at the rotten smell of the deceased lugging around on the ground below him, while he looked over them on his perch: a sturdy branch that stretched from a tree. The zombies passing by were scarce, and he'd be staring off at the horizon, unbothered by growling for minutes on end before another undead limped by.

Arthur then focused on the sky that held the sun dearly in a sort of embrace, as though, trying in vain to shield the flaring giant from the terrifying reality of Earth. He snorted cynically.

For a split second he suddenly felt his heart jump into his throat and his stomach drop; his skin breaking in cold sweat as his hand went for the gun he kept securely in his pocket. Arthur's green eyes snapped to the base of his tree, expecting a zombie that somehow spotted him on his perch to stare back with its milky, dead eyes. A sigh of relief escaped Arthur's chapped, cracked lips when he saw a familiar shit-eating grin and white hair.

Gilbert climbed the tree with expertise, anchoring himself up onto a branch that stretched higher up from Arthur's, thus dangling his long, gangly legs over the branch he now perched on.

"You do realise it's still dangerous out here, right?"

He wasn't condescending, nor was he trying too hard to sound pitiful, and that was exactly what Arthur liked about the albino. Gilbert understood him, and it had been that way since they were hyperactive children. He appreciated him, really.

"Of course I do," Arthur looked up at Gilbert's eyes that bore into his own, "it isn't that dangerous, Gil." He insisted, leaning against the tree bark. It was rough, as he had grown used to, and suddenly Arthur found himself craving home. Where the wood was polished and processed, smoothed out for comfort. Just one of the many differences in his living conditions, he supposed.

"Besides," Arthur added, "I can fend for myself." annoyance lilted his voice at that point.

Gilbert rolled his eyes and swung a leg over to the other side of the branch, and allowed himself to lean his back against the rough surface of the tree bark leisurely. It was silent, for a while, with the exception of the occasional staggering zombies. The wind picked up, capturing the fragrance of trees and nature at its purest, in addition to the tangy, stomach churning smell of decomposing skin. "Kay," Gilbert started, "tell me." he said, demanded. Arthur stared contemplatively at a magpie pecking at the ground, perhaps searching for food. Gilbert just waited, ever so patiently even when the sun that barely was out of reach to the grasping hands of the horizon, started to bleed the sky orange.

'He never rushes you, Arthur.' He thought to himself. 'You can trust him. Gil's been with you through thick and thin, and god damn it all, if he's still patient with you even when everything has gone to hell,' Arthur peeked to the other side of the tree bark, where Gilbert was quietly humming to himself, 'then you can spill it.'

His tongue felt like sandpaper but he pushed himself to say it either way, because it was bothering him in the back of his mind since they got out of town.

"I killed Alfred."


End file.
